1. FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a vinyl fabric and method for its manufacture and lamination. In particular, the fabric is intended for upholstery purposes and related uses.
2. PRIOR ART
The use of plastic and laminated plastic fabrics is a well developed art, especially fabrics for upholstering seats, benches, both for domestic and commercial use as well as in cars. Various types of plastic material have been proposed or used for these purposes including polyurethane and vinyl-derived or related plastics. Polyurethane has the disadvantage of being relatively expensive, but does have some advantages in terms of its being able to be used in thinner films. Being thin, it has a certain compliance with the shape of the body that enables it to be used for garments without being unduly tearable due to its high tensile strength. Those same characteristics also enable it to be used for handbags, for example. When it comes to possible applications for upholstering, however, its cost makes it non-competitive for many applications. Besides, when so used, ambient moisture can break down the urethane component and render it powdery. This tends to reduce its overall strength.
Vinyl, on the other hand, is less expensive than polyurethane and has been extensively used for upholstery purposes. It has certain disadvantages when so used, especially when used with buttons for the upholstery, because the continual flexing of the fabrics upon impact with the human body sometimes allows the button to fall out and the stitching holding it in place to tear along the stitch lines. Usually, vinyl is used with a backing of some kind so as to prevent some of these problems. Expanded vinyl, i.e., vinyl with cells formed therein by conventional "blowing" agents, is sometimes used for upholstery applications, but it has the disadvantage that folding of the expanded vinyl or flexing at the same place will ultimately cause the cells to break down. As a result, the fold line or the flex line retains the creases for far too long.
In addition, vinyl must be so made that when used for upholstery covering material, it will resist the constant rubbing of its surface by the human body in use which will abrade its surface as, for example, when people slip into or out of a booth containing vinyl-covered seats or benches.
Nonetheless, vinyl is still one of the principal ingredients of fabrics intended for upholstery covering.
In the past, vinyl-based fabrics have been available, but they have not had as leather-like a "hand", i.e., the desired texture, suppleness, and drape that real leather possesses. Sometimes this is the case because the composite, laminated fabric has the backing layer pressed relatively deeply into the surface of the vinyl to which it is adhered either by heat and pressure or by the use of an intermediate adhesive under the desired pressure conditions during lamination. When non-woven fabrics are used, their very construction tends to reduce the resilience, compliance or suppleness of the composite laminated material. Another reason for the deficient hand or suppleness is the vinyl composition used. The elasticity of plastics such as vinyl is adjustable by the use of plasticizers, but it has usually been the case that vinyl sheets or webs made either by extrusion or calendering processes are limited in the proportion of plasticizer relative to the resin that may be employed with out impairing the characteristics of the vinyl sheet.
The suppleness of a vinyl fabric is, in large measure, a function of the amount of plasticizer used. While ratios of 3:2 of resin to plasticizer have been known, lower ratios approaching equality are not known to be used in extrusion or calendering methods of forming unsupported vinyl sheet. With plastisol methods of forming vinyl sheeting, lower ratios approaching equality are known, but the types of resin and release paper carrier sheet used in making the fabric are considerably more expensive.
It is therefore among the objects of the present invention to provide:
1. A highly supple vinyl sheet material having a pleasing hand.
2. A vinyl-laminated material having excellent suppleness, hand and drape characteristics.
3. An unexpanded vinyl sheet possessing excellent hand.
4. A vinyl laminate highly suitable for upholstery purposes.
5. A method of making the vinyl sheet material mentioned above and laminating it to desired substrates for upholstery and kindred purposes.
6. A strong but supple, stretchable, upholstery fabric that does not suffer from the effects of hydrolytic exposure.
7. A vinyl sheet material and laminates thereof which possess excellent crease resistance.
8. A vinyl sheet material and laminates thereof for upholstery and related uses that is relatively inexpensive and has many of the desirable features of real leather.